June 26. My birthday. June 26. St. Josemaría Escrivá’s feast day. June 26. A landmark day for Supreme Court rulings on same-sex cases. June 26, 2003: the United States Supreme Court declared a Texas law unconstitutional that made it a crime for two persons of the same-sex to engage in intimate sexual conduct. June 26, […]

“It is most laudable in a married woman to be devout, but she must never forget that she is a housewife. And sometimes she must leave God at the altar to find Him in her housekeeping.” I first read those words by St. Frances of Rome back on March 9, her feast day. Depending on how you feel […]

How would you answer this question … Outline a marriage preparation program for your parish. Explain what components you would like to include and why. Joel had to answer this very question for his sacramental theology course, and we thought it made good blog post material, too. It’s the topic of our latest column at Catholic […]

I learned to cook out of necessity. I was 34 when Lisa and I got married, so I would have starved otherwise. I had also found that women were usually impressed by men who could cook. Let’s be honest here. Before we met, I was single in my early 30s with no prospects. Needless to say, I was getting desperate.

We were scheduled to lead a young couples event at a parish in eastern Iowa today. We’ve been defeated by the weather once again this winter and were not able to travel due to the snow. But all is not lost. We share with you, dear readers, a portion of our presentation titled “Strengthening the Mr. and Mrs. Once You’re Dad and Mom: The Beatitudes of Healthy Marriages.” Please keep in mind the target audience was young married couples with one or more little ones at home.

Several years ago, I had the opportunity to read from 1 Corinthians for a friend’s wedding. I’ve never really heard it or read it the same way since. It’s the standard to which we should hold ourselves, particularly as a married couple and parents. It’s a high standard, but so much depends upon how well we love. We directly impact the salvation of our spouses and children by how well we measure up to 1 Corinthians 13:4-8. So, how’s my lovely wife doing?

So as long as we seem to be on something of a roll, there’s one more topic we’re feeling called to specifically address. It’s one that comes up all the time in social situations. It goes something like this …

Why didn’t anyone tell us about natural family planning when we were younger? Now that we’re done having kids, what are we supposed to do?

Well, what does it mean to be “done having kids”? From our experience in conversing with couples, this essentially is one of three different scenarios. We flesh them out (yes, flesh seems the proper word here).

Did you know devout Catholics have better sex? That was a recent headline in U.S. News and World Report so it must be true. Right? Now if you’re a devout Catholic, your response might be something on the order of, “Duh, I’ve been saying it for years!” If you’re not on board with all the Church’s teachings on human sexuality, your response might be something like, “Come on, this can’t be serious!”

So why do we bring this up today? We highlight a scenario making it difficult to practice natural family planning. And it’s going to take a whole lot more than simply slipping a copy of that news story or the Family Research Council report into a place where one spouse will find it.